'Halloween' scares up $77.5 million in ticket sales

Janice Underwood |Tuesday, October 23, 2018

Box Office: ‘Halloween’ Kills Competition with Historic $80M Debut

"Halloween" is now Curtis' biggest opening to date, as well as the best horror opening with a female lead. The movie reportedly sold about 8.8 million tickets, which is already a lot better than Box Office Pro's initial forecast back in August that the sequel would draw in just 6.8 million horror fans and other curious nostalgia seekers.

That being said, the $77.5 million gross also gives Halloween the second biggest opening ever for a horror movie, falling only behind It.

Forty years after he first appeared in theaters, Michael Myers is still drawing huge audiences for a good scare.

Directed by David Gordon Green from a script co-written by himself, Jeff Fradley and Danny McBride, the film starsJamie Lee Curtis, Judy Greer, Andi Matichak, Will Patton, Virginia Gardner, Miles Robbins, Dylan Arnold, Drew Scheid, and Nick Castle. That easily beat the old record for a slasher movie, set in 2009 by a reboot of the "Friday the 13th" series, and keeps the industry on a record path for October.

The movie cost just $10 million to make, before marketing costs, and was projected to debut to as much as $70 million, according to Box Office Mojo. Until this weekend, Curtis' biggest opening was for Beverly Hills Chihuahua at $29 million. It's like the Star Wars: The Force Awakens of slasher movies, sort of.

Oddly enough, while it seems like the movies are having an awesome October, this month is still quite low compared to many other years, even with one more weekend and 10 whole days left to go. A year ago hadn't even hit a billion by this point, even with IT. The horror genre is one of the most enduring in Hollywood, even as the box office has become more challenging, with titles regularly breaching expectations.

Thirty People Injured After Floor Collapses At Party
Witnesses said the party at the event space of an apartment complex was just getting started when the floor collapsed. Reports say many people were taken to local hospitals with injuries but none were considered life-threatening.

Jordan cancels part of 1994 peace agreement with Israel
Under their peace agreement, Jordan agreed to grant Israeli farmers and military officers free access to the enclave. The case of Baqoura could provide a predicament for Israel and Jordan given a possible dispute over land rights.

IPhone XR available for pre-order from Friday
This is significantly lower than the XS and XS Max , and at par with the launch prices of last year's iPhone 8 and 8 Plus. For selfies, the iPhone XR sports a 7MP selfie camera with a f/2.2 aperture along with a TrueDepth camera for FaceID.